Friday, August 2, 2013

The great majority of the middle and lower classes is
naturally not fin-de-siecle.It is true that the spirit of the times is stirring the nations down to
their lowest depths, and awaking even in the most inchoate and rudimentary
human being a wondrous feeling of stir and upheaval.But this more or less slight touch of moral
sea-sickness does not excite in him the cravings of travailing women, nor
express itself in new aesthetic needs. The Philistine or the Proletarian still
finds undiluted satisfac­tion in the old and oldest forms of art and poetry, if
he knows himself unwatched by the scornful eye of the votary of fashion, and is
free to yield to his own inclinations.He prefers Ohnet's novelstoallthesymbolists,andMascagni'sCavalleria Rusticana toallWagneriansandtoWagner himself;he enjoys himself royally over
slap-dashfarcesand music-hall melodies, and yawns or
is angered at Ibsen ; he contemplates gladly chromos of paintings depicting
Munich beer-houses and rustic taverns,andpasses the open-air painterswithouta glance.It is only a very small
minority who honestly find pleasureinthenew tendencies,andannouncethemwith genuine
conviction as that which alone is sound, a sure guide for the future, a pledge
of pleasure and of moral benefit.But this minority has the gift of covering the
whole visible surface of society, as a little oil extends over a large area of
the surface of the sea.It consists chiefly of rich educated people, or of fanatics.The former give the ton to
all the snobs, the fools, and the blockheads; the latter make an impression
upon the weak and dependent, and intimidate the nervous.All snobs affect tohavethesame
tasteastheselectand exclusive minority, who pass by
everything that once was considered beautiful with an air of the greatest
contempt.And thus it
appears as if the whole of civilized humanity were converted to the aesthetics
of the Dusk of the Nations.